Unspoken · Rules
Stacey Slinger · Cape Town, South Africa

Read the system. Shift the pattern. Move with intent.

I'm a researcher and practitioner of systems leadership. I write, research, and consult — helping South African organisations get underneath the symptoms and address what's actually driving attrition, disengagement, and leadership gaps. This work sits under a practice called Culture by Design.

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Portrait of Stacey Slinger, founder of Unspoken Rules
Stacey Slinger · Cape Town
About

Researcher. Practitioner. Same chair.

Unspoken Rules is where I sit as both a researcher and a practitioner of systems leadership. The thinking is grounded in a 2022 master's thesis on systems leadership in South African organisations. The practice is grounded in years of building programmes, facilitating teams, and working alongside corporates, NGOs, and creative communities — including In Good Company, my creative home championing microcultures in Cape Town.

Most leadership writing comes from somewhere else — Boston, London, the Valley. I write from inside post-traumatic colonialism, SETA politics, and the most unequal society on the data. That specificity is the work.

Outcomes are shaped by codes, not effort. Systems leadership is the discipline of reading the codes — and choosing where to move.
The lens

Head, Heart, Hands — the lens behind the practice.

One lens, three angles. Used for pattern recognition and connection recognition — the work of reading a whole, not just managing a part.

Head

The thinking. What does the system actually look like? Who's in it, what's flowing between them, and where is it stuck?

Heart

The behaviour. What codes, fears, loyalties, and beliefs are shaping how people move inside the system?

Hands

The action. Where is the leverage point? What's the smallest move that shifts the most — and who's positioned to make it?

Head + Heart + Hands  ×  Systems Leadership  =  pattern and connection recognition
The frameworks

Thinking tools behind the method.

Every session draws on established frameworks from systems thinking, developmental psychology, and organisational change. These are not decorative — they are the analytical tools we use to locate leverage and design coherent responses.

Framework 01
Head · Heart · Hands
Unspoken Rules methodology
A whole-person change model that sequences cognitive reframing, identity shift, and practical action — in that order, because order matters.
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Framework 02
Six Conditions for Systems Change
Kania, Kramer & Senge · 2018
Structural, relational, and transformative levers for change. The transformative layer — mental models — is where most interventions fail to reach.
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Framework 03
Systems Mapping: The Iceberg Model
Systems Thinking tradition
Most organisations react to events. This model locates the structures, relationships, and mental models that generate those events — the invisible root causes.
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Framework 04
Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs
Abraham Maslow · 1943
Used in this work to understand what a mental model is protecting — safety, belonging, esteem — which determines what it takes to shift it without destabilisation.
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Work with me

Culture by Design.

Four offerings. One premise: most organisations manage symptoms, not the system underneath them.

Diagnostic · Teams & Organisations

Retention Diagnostic

For HR Directors and People leads who know people are leaving but can't name the real reason.

Your exit interviews are giving you the polite version. This diagnostic goes underneath — mapping the invisible rules shaping how people move through your organisation, and identifying where the leak actually is.

You leave with: a clear map of what's driving attrition and the specific intervention point where the work needs to happen. Timeline: 3–4 weeks.
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Leadership Development · Managers

Leading from the Root

For senior managers who've tried everything at the surface level and know the problem runs deeper.

Most leadership development works at the level of behaviour. This programme goes to the system underneath — teaching you to read the whole before acting on any part of it. Head, Heart, Hands: see it, understand it, move it.

You leave with: a documented system map, named patterns, and one grounded move that shifts the culture — not just the conduct.
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Organisational Design · People & Talent

Early Career Integration Design

For talent and people leads losing graduates in year one despite investing in recruitment.

Not a workshop for your graduates — a design process for your organisation. We map the system a graduate lands in on day one, find the gaps between what you assume and what you've shown, and redesign that system so the investment you made recruiting them doesn't walk out at 18 months.

You leave with: a redesigned integration pathway your organisation owns and can repeat with every new cohort.
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Facilitation · Culture & OD

Cross-Generational Culture Facilitation

For culture and transformation leads navigating generational friction no one wants to name out loud.

The tension between generations in SA workplaces isn't a personality clash — it's two sets of unspoken rules colliding in the same room. This is a structured facilitated process to get that conversation out of the hallway and into the room, where it can actually be worked with.

You leave with: a shared language for what's been unspeakable, and a foundation for culture that both generations helped build.
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Founding client offer

50% off all four offerings for engagements beginning in June. One spot per offering.

Apply now →
Writing & research

Field notes, essays, working papers.

Published
The Waiting Room Effect
Essay · LinkedIn
Published
Curiosity is the strategy
Essay · LinkedIn
Published
Your work doesn't speak for itself
Essay · LinkedIn
Published
Talent is not enough
Essay · LinkedIn
Published
'Be proactive' is not neutral advice
Essay · LinkedIn
In progress
Mental models as the unaddressed condition of systems change — empirical evidence from South African organisations
Research · 01
Planned
The knowing–naming gap — why SA organisations practise systems leadership implicitly, and why that itself is a systems barrier
Research · 02
Planned
The marginalised connector — how the non-profit sector holds South Africa's systems change ecosystem together, and why its marginalisation is a design flaw
Research · 03
2022
A broad look into the practice of systems leadership in South African organisations
Thesis

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Proof

CV & accomplishments.

Practice

Founder — Unspoken Rules

Behavioural systems consultancy · 2024 – present

Founder — In Good Company NPC

Creative home championing microcultures · Cape Town

Systems mapping facilitation

Corporates, NGOs, SETAs, communities of practice

Programme & learning design

Career readiness, leadership development, workforce pipelines

Research & credentials

MSc Management & Leadership

University of Pécs · 2022 · NQF Level 9 equivalent

Master's thesis

A broad look into the practice of systems leadership in South African organisations

Speaking & writing

LinkedIn essays, partner workshops, panel contributions

Sectoral experience

Private sector, public sector, civil society, youth development

What people say
"She always went out of her way to ensure that we understand the work and what was expected of us. Not only was she a good lecturer — she was a genuinely nice person as well."

Nanette Basson  ·  Student, Professional Practice · 2025

Download CV (PDF)
Get in touch

Have a system you'd like to read together?

Whether it's a team, an organisation, a research question, or your own career — if there's a pattern worth surfacing, I'd like to hear about it.

Book a conversation Email Stacey
Book calendar.app.google/7r3J7jUP3gpNdjCD6
CV Download CV (PDF)
Email stacey@unspokenrules.co.za
Mobile 071 024 7230
Web unspokenrules.co.za
LinkedIn Stacey Slinger
Sister org ingoodcompany.org.za